Timber!: RoyOMartin is investing $8 million at its plywood and solid wood plant in central Louisiana to add a dry kiln designed to increase timber production, company officials say. The Alexandria-based company will also increase log capacity, and expand the facility’s shipping and finishing area. The project will create 14 new direct jobs at the facility in Chopin, where 680 employees currently work. To secure the investment, the state is providing RoyOMartin an incentive package that includes a performance-based, forgivable loan of $350,000 from the state’s Economic Development Award Program. Louisiana Economic Development has full details.
Hot cocoa and laptops: A school district in South Carolina has done away with its much-loved snow days and will instead require students to do classwork online, The Washington Post reports. Officials with Anderson County School District 5 announced last week on social media that the district has been chosen to “pilot the first eLearning program in the state of South Carolina,” meaning that when roads are too treacherous for travel, teachers will send assignments to the students’ school-supplied Chromebooks. The district calendar states that “inclement weather days will be eLearning days and will not be made up.” Read the full story.
Under capacity LNG: Europe is unlikely to veer from its current plans to build a small number of new plants for importing liquefied natural gas, energy experts tell The Washington Post. That casts doubts on President Donald Trump’s claim that he has secured commitments from the European Union for the construction of nine to 11 plants to boost U.S. exports. While there have already been about a dozen proposals on the drawing boards, no more than three or four new plants will be built anytime soon, because the existing 24 LNG import facilities in Europe are running at about a quarter of their capacity. Read the full story.
